32 June 6 • 2019
jn

THE TRIBE AT THE TONYS
The Tony Awards, for excellence in 
Broadway theater, will be presented on 
Sunday, June 9, at 8 p.m. on CBS. Here 
are the confirmed Jewish nominees in all 
but the technical categories. 
This is an atypical year in 
that no Jewish playwrights 
were nominated for best 
(new) play.
Elaine May, 87, is a 
leading actress in a play 
nominee. She co-stars in 
a revival of the 2001 play 
The Waverly Gallery by 
Oscar-winner Kenneth 
Lonergan, 56 (whose 
mother was Jewish). May 
plays the Jewish owner of a 
Manhattan art gallery who 
is gradually declining due to 
Alzheimer’
s. May became 
famous in the late ’
50s 
as the partner of the late 
Mike Nichols in the brilliant 
comedy team of Nichols 
and May. Later, she wrote 
and directed the hit film The 
New Leaf and she directed 
The Heartbreak Kid. Her 
life partner of 20 years, the 
great director/choreographer 
Stanley Donen (Singin’
 
in the Rain, Seven Brides 
for Seven Brothers) died in 
February at age 94. 
Brandon Uranowitz, 32, 
is a best featured (support-
ing) actor in a play nominee 
for Burn This. It’
s a 1987 play 
with many gay themes. This 
is the third Tony nomination 
for Uranowitz. Nominated in 
the same category is Gideon 
Glick, 30, who plays the 
child character “Dill” in the 
new stage version of To Kill 
a Mockingbird. 
Best director, musical: 
Rachel Chavkin, 38, for 
Hadestown, which grabbed 
the most Tony nominations 
of any show this year. It’
s 
a retelling of a Greek myth, 
reset in the 1930s. Chavkin 
won best director of a 
musical Tony in 2015. Sam 
Mendes, 53, is up for best 
director of a play, The Ferryman. Mendes 
is British and his mother is Jewish. He 
won an Oscar for directing American 

Beauty, and he directed the James Bond 
films Skyfall and Spectre. 
David Yazbek, 58, is nominated for 
writing the original score for the stage 
musical version of the hit film Tootsie. Last 
year, the musical The Band’
s Visit, about 
the interaction of Egyptians and Israelis, 
swept the musical categories and Yazbek 
won the Tony for his score 
(music & lyrics). Yazbek’
s 
mother is Jewish. He com-
petes in this category with 
his old friend Adam Guettel, 
54, who wrote the score for 
To Kill a Mockingbird. In the 
’
90s, Guettel and Yazbek 
played in a band together. 
In 2000, Guettel declined 
an offer to write the score 
for The Full Monty and gave 
Yazbek his big career break 
when Yazbek got the job 
because Guettel recom-
mended him. Guettel is the 
grandson of the late, great 
composer Richard Rodgers. 
Adam’
s mother, the late Mary 
Rodgers, also composed 
(Once upon a Mattress) and 
wrote (the original Freaky 
Friday movie.) Guettel won 
the best score Tony in 2005 
for The Light in the Piazza. 
Yaszbek and Guettel com-
pete with Matthew Sklar, 45, 
who wrote the music for The 
Prom, a show about a lesbian 
teen going to a prom in a 
conservative Midwest town. 
Sklar’
s longtime professional 
partner, Chad Begulin, wrote 
the lyrics. 
Oklahoma!, a 1943 musi-
cal co-written by Richard 
Rodgers, is Tony-nominated 
this year in the best musical 
(revival) category. Oklahoma! 
vies with Kiss Me Kate for 
this Tony. Larry Hochman, 
65, is nominated for his 
Kiss Me, Kate orchestra-
tion. He’
s won four Emmys 
for his compositions and a 
Tony for orchestration (Book 
of Mormon). His works 
include the orchestration 
of a Chanukah album and 
composing the song poem “In 
Memoriam” in commemora-
tion of the Holocaust.
The Tony nominees for best 
play (revival) include Waverly Place, All My 
Sons by the late Arthur Miller and Torch 
Song Trilogy by Harvey Fierstein, 64. ■

NATE BLOOM
COLUMNIST

celebrity jews
arts&life

Rachel Chavkin

Sam Mendes

Gideon Glick

Harvey Fierstein

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